Monday, May 9, 2011

Cake Carrier Lamp

A few weeks ago I posted about my cake carrier lamp I made for my guest room/ studio space. Today I thought I'd show you how I put it all together. Actually it was alarmingly easy ( I say alarming because most of the time my hair brained schemes are a lot more work)

I found my cake carrier for FREE at a yard sale but I have seen similar things on thrift shops and most certainly ebay.

As badly as I wanted to turn this into a lamp I had a big problem, the inside of the cake carrier is also bright yellow and when I placed it over an exsisting lamp the light it put out could only be described as "Bug Light" yellow, not what I had in mind for a bedside reading lamp. Husband said I should paint the inside, (NO way!) the bright yellow is the best part! I had to come up with another option, so I decided to try making a lamp with 2 lampshades, an inner white one, and my beloved cake carrier top.

Initial I wanted to find a lamp base at a thrift store but I was having trouble finding something that would work for the size of the cake carrier

So I caved and bought this new one on clearance at Target, totally not my style but hey it was only $8!

First thing I did was remove the, ummm...graphic print pattern from the shade as my kitty looked wistfully out the window.

Her name is Meetu, because her personality as a little sister cat is "Me Too!"

Whoa, tangent!

Anyways, because the shade was 10" tall and I needed it to be 6" I removed the vinyl, cut a 4" strip off and hot glued the vinyl shade back onto the wire lamp shade things.

Then I covered the rebuilt lampshade in a light white fabric

I painted the base of the lamp with the perfectly matching yellow spray paint I already had. How lucky is that?!

then with just a few glue dots i adheared the top of the cake carrier to the top of the lamp shade, clicked on the light and fell in love!

Here you can see the white shade underneath the top of the cake carrier.

since I did not alter the actual carrier I can always dismantle my lamp and still have a vintage cake carrier to use.

I saw this featured over at Under the Table and Dreaming and just had to come by for a visit. Your cake carrier/lamp shade is wonderful. I absolutely love it. I recently thrifted a small cake carrier and might borrow your brilliant idea. Thanks for sharing.

The lamp turned out amazing. Love the creative idea of using the cake carrier - so unique! Thanks so much for linking to the Sunday Showcase Party - I greatly appreciate it. I have featured this today. Enjoy the rest of your week ~ Stephanie Lynnwww.bystephanielynn.com

This has to be one of the coolest ideas ever!!! I bought a cake carrier extremely similar to yours a couple years ago at a garage sale and it is just sitting on top of my kitchen cabinets...IT will become a cute lamp for my buffet in my dresser....

Found this on PINTEREST and I am now your newest follower...come visit my blog too!!!

Saw this on Better After and had to come take at look at how it was done. So cute! I have a vintage carrier that I no longer had a space for and it's been sitting in the attic because I can't bear to get rid of it. But this is a fabulous idea! I'm definitely going to be on the lookout for a lamp now!

That is wonderful. You did a great job. As a child we had a cake carrier similar to yours. It was tin with apples on it. Mom always had it on top of the fridge out of reach when there was a dessert. That didn't work when we got older.

Thanks Sheina! As for the lamp getting hot there is a space between the bulb and the top of the carrier. Since there is an inner shade it diffuses a lot of the heat. After having the lamp on for hours the top is warm to the touch but not hot by any means. Hope that helps. ~Merrilee